Kay Shuler Davis Lay

Kay Shuler Davis Lay SAWDUST - Kay Shuler Davis Lay, 66, passed Wednesday, May 14, 2008, at her home, where she was born and married. Graveside services were Friday, May 16, at Hillcrest Cemetery. Charles McClellan Funeral Home, Quincy (850-627-7677), handled arrangements. She was a graduate of Quincy High School and Queens College in Charlotte, N.C. After college, she worked for Farm Journal Magazine in Philadelphia, returning to Florida in 1967 as an information specialist for the State Comptroller's Office and later the Florida Division of Forestry. Before her birth, her brothers and sisters saved quarters to pay for her. Dr. Sterling Wilhoit was startled to receive this unusual payment, but drove all the way back from town to tell her parents she was the first baby he had delivered born "under a veil." According to Bible and folk tradition, this meant she would be able to tell the future. Instead, she always cared for, and worked to preserve, the past. One such project had been Gadsden County's Shade Tobacco heritage. In 1984, she and her husband, Bob Lay Sr., set out to save the family tobacco barn, which she saw as full of community ties and representative of the hundreds of barns disappearing daily from the landscape. This project resulted in occasional "Barn Days" to give local people, newcomers and others a chance to re-live Shade Tobacco times. She is survived by her brother, Forrest (Ann) Davis of Quincy; two sisters, Saradee Davis (Tom) Bowen of Chipley and Betty Davis (Bill) Morrison of Charlotte, N.C.; and many nieces, nephews, great-nieces and great-newphews. She is also survived by her stepchildren, Bob (Sue) Lay Jr. of Havana, Anita (Jim) Rubarth-Lay of Austin, Texas, and Melinda Lay Ruby of Buda, Texas; and three stepgrandchildren. She was preceded in death by her husband, Bob Lay Sr.; a stepson, Dennis Barden Lay; her parents, Forrest and Olean Shuler Davis; and a brother, Hal Davis Sr. Instead of flowers, she requests that memorial contributions be made to Big Bend Hospice, 105 North Jackson St., Quincy, FL 32351, Tallahassee Heights United Methodist Church General Fund, 3004 Mahan Dr., Tallahassee, FL 32308, or to Woodland-Gretna Presbyterian Church General Fund, P.O. Box 19, Gretna, FL 32332.